Another
of our African hunts is now history and an excellent hunt it turned out to be.
After a very dismal start with the New York black-out hitting the east coast the
night before we left, it had to get better. With no planes being allowed to land
in New York's JFK, we were routed to Atlanta about 2 hours out of New York. The
Delta folks told us that over 600 planes had been routed to Atlanta and the
international terminal was wall to wall people trying to get a plane to
anywhere. We were stranded there overnight but managed to get out the next
morning on the next South African Airlines jet heading to Johannesburg. After
arriving, settling in and one days hunt under our belt I think 4 of my 6 guys
were a bit intimidated by the spookiness of the African game and the ranges we
had to shoot in. 200 yards was common and for a handgun that is not always easy.
Hell, that's not always easy with a rifle, especially after running for a half
mile or crawling for 700 yards and being out of breath and having the PH tell
you, "there he is, on the right, shoot him". You are trying to
jumpstart your heart, get your breath and calm down your puckered up ass all at
the same time and still get in a shot in the 5 seconds allotted you. At dinner
that night there were a few long sighs due to missed shots but as I told them,
that's hunting. If every shot was a kill, they would call it killing, not
hunting. As the days wore on the missed shots became fewer and the smiles
replaced the frowns. We began to spot the game quicker and were able to judge
the horns a bit better, although never better than the PH or the trackers. One
thing I always stress to my guys is, when the PH says shoot a certain animal,
never question him, just pull the trigger. You have to remember, when your name
goes into the record book, so does his. So he wants you to get a good trophy
animal, just as much as you do. Of the 36 animals the 6 hunters took, it looks
like all but 2 of them will hit the record book. I spent a few hours at the
skinning shed doing some preliminary scoring and it looks like there will be
several animals that will be the new #1 in the world and maybe as many as 10 in
the top 3 in the world. These are in the handgun book but almost half our
animals were taken with rifles and the animals taken with rifles scored
exceptionally well also. I will have the actual scores within a week and will
post them on the next Gun Notes.

I
think the main thing the guys learned in Africa is that African game is much
much harder to put down than our game here in the states. Small animals the size
of a Key deer or Coues Deer were taking 2 and 3 magnum rifle rounds to put down,
even with a center chest shot. I personally have seen animals weighing 60 pounds
max take a center chest shot, completely blowing the heart out of the chest
cavity and into a bush behind the animal and the critter runs for a half mile.
Situations like this happen time and time again in Africa. You may go to Africa
with an ego as large as Cleveland but you'll come back mighty humbled and a much
better hunter.

Our
next hunt will probably be early next summer. I will be setting the actual date
in the next month or two and start booking it around the first of the year.

A
lot of items cropping up in the gun industry while I was away. S&W still
having some problems with their new 500. The factory ammo is being reworked
using large rifle primers and new data is in the new Hodgdon book although
Hornady is still planning to use the magnum pistol primers in their ammo. There
is a new 500 S&W loading coming. A 370 grain gas check LBT bullet that
should do well. I like the lighter weight bullets over the heavy ones myself.
This one should be a better balanced load. Hornady is still planning to put out
the 500 Linebaugh brass and will have the new 500 Linebaugh dies out by the time
you read this. Their dies are excellent, by the way. Hornady will also have the
shell plates for the 500 Linebaugh available for their progressive presses.

I
am still hearing rumors of a beefier model 92 rifle action coming out chambered
for the 500 S&W. And not necessarily by Winchester. There are several other
people out there manufacturing the model 92 action.

We
have a new lever gun on the drawing board chambered in one of our new
cartridges. It is based on the model 1894 Marlin. More on that a bit later.

For
those of you shooting the new 17 HMR, ammo is becoming a bit more plentiful. At
our gun shop it is fairly easy to order it now where it was tough a few months
ago. CCI is working night and day cranking it out.

For
you 32 freaks there may be a new revolver chambered in 32 H&R and 32-20
coming out. Still in the pre-production stages. More on this one next time.

Response
to the new 223 WSSM and 243 WSSM cartridges has been very good. Mike Jordan of
Winchester ammo showed us the cartridges at the celebrity Handgun Hunt last
year. Very impressive looking although I haven't had a chance to shoot one. I
had planned to chamber both of them in our Ultimate Encore when the ammo is
readily available.

One
thing I was very pleased with concerning our Africa hunt was the performance of
our custom cartridges. All but one of our hunters took guns chambered in our GNR
calibers and all performed flawlessly. Rick Sim used our 375 GNR #2 and the 338
GNR, both in the encore. Brian Doher took several animals with the 378 GNR in
his encore, and the 300 GNR in a revolver. Larry Kovach, on his 3rd trip there,
used the 41 GNR, and the 410 GNR. Keith Kallsen used our new Ultimate 410
prototype revolver in 410 GNR and I used my old standby 378 GNR encore barrel
along with a revolver in 410 GNR and the prototype revolver in 510 GNR and
another encore in 375 GNR #2. The bullets used in the various calibers performed
very well also. Larry Kovach shot his large record book Hartebeest end to end,
throat to bung hole with the 410 GNR, the bullet ending up under the skin of
it's ass like a big wart. The 255 grain LBT could literally have been shot
again. Only a very slight smear on the nose. The 350 grain LBT bullets used in
the 510 GNR did just as well on the larger animals, plowing right thru. I shot 2
animals in the 800 pound range with it and only recovered one bullet, all of
them blowing right thru. The bullet recovered was found on the ground by one of
the trackers. All in all some very impressive results from the guns, the
calibers and especially the FNGs, now officially FOGs.